GOGSoc the Third

I think Nyet might be...?

Nyet

x

*Washes mouth out with soap at mentioning evil business courses* :wink:

Reply 1182

Consultant

9

IlexAquifolium

I think Nyet might be...?

*Washes mouth out with soap at mentioning evil business courses* :wink:

Cool! Thanks, don't look down on us too much; I for one at least did a hard science at undergraduate/masters level. :tongue:

Reply 1183

Ok, really don't know what to do now - think my options of "what I want" and "what I really want" are changing around. Hmmm :juggle:

Reply 1184

Care to elaborate teapot? :tongue:

Reply 1185

Da Bachtopus

12

Drogue

Excuse my striking un-nerdiness (I never thought I'd say that without irony) and ignorance, but what is that?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agr%C3%A9gation

The exam is meant to provide positions in Lycées (ie. teaching at VIth form level or in the Classes préparatoires). There is another exam, known as the CAPES, which I suppose is a bit like a PGCE and which covers 'general' teaching at primary or secondary level. The agrég, however, is apprently very hard -- not by virtue of being intellectually demanding, but by its being prescriptive. The fact that the number of places available each year is limited means that those who take it work insanely hard, so it's hugely competitive, though ultimately examines who did the most preparation, rather than who has the most ability. I love the Wiki line on this: "The students of the écoles normales supérieures often give up an entire year of their adult life to prepare for any potential question." It's true; they just disappear and don't like talking to you very much.

Of my friends who have done or are doing it, none seem to find it enjoyable or want to do it. Here is the fun part, though (well, fun if you're a bemused bystander):

1) The agrég technically has nothing to do with teaching positions in universities, which are handled (at the moment, though the system is likely to be reformed very soon) by application to a central agency or something. I don't understand this yet, but I don't have to, so am not trying, and it will probably have all changed by the time I apply.

2) The agrég is supposedly hard and a sign of something or other.

3) Everyone who wants to teach at the university has always taken the agrég, presumably because of (2). Certainly the majority of university professors come from the Grandes Écoles, so are already caught up in the prestige-bubble.

4) You get that they don't actually have to take it?

5) But because all French university professors have taken the agrég everyone supposes that you have to.

6) So everyone takes the agrég.

7) Even though they don't have to.

8) Because if they're up against a candidate who had taken it, they might not get the post. Or something. They would also then have the opportunity to declare their national 'ranking' against other candidates, which (see (2)).

37) Nobody expects me to take the agrég because I'm forn, innit?

EDIT: Wiki article confuses it a bit by talking about the Higher Education thing. That has nothing to do with students, it's like the German Habilitation. I don't even think it's actually called an agrégation.

I should also add that some people actually do want to teach in the Lycées and have no interest in an academic career.

EDIT 2: The French wikipedia article is more intersting, since it's basically full of people ranting and other people telling them they need footnotes. It is probably incomprehensible to someone who doesn't understand how the system here works though.

EDIT 3: I forgot to add, though, that the whole argument that "A university committee will priviledge someone with the agrég because they can be assured they'll be a good teacher" is utterly fallacious. If the committees priledge people with the agrég, it's because they themselves have it, I suspect, and don't want to question its value. But, quite simply:

(i) The agrég does not prepare you to teach well. It's a massive prescriptive exams. If it makes you prepare a 'sample class' as part of the orals, this is in the form of a /lecture/ or 'cours magistral'. You see, French pedagogy is fundamentally non-dialectic. Teaching at university level = lecturing, nothing else, and even in the Lycées and the Prépas, I think this whole very precsriptive, non-discursive attitude is still prevalent.

(ii) So anyway, the fact that the agrég has nothing to do with teaching in any real sense invalidates the whole idea that it is a useful criterion. It also means that, as an examination designed to give people teaching posts, it's ridiculous.

(iii) The agrég itself destroys the possibility that the best teaching jobs go to the best teachers, and perpetuates an absurdly C19th approach to pedagogy, which is never going to be reformed until the agrég is.

I really think getting rid of it, or changing it radically, would be a good idea. However, I am not entirely convinced by the planned reforms. The projected university reform, in other areas, is absolutely dreadful.

Reply 1186

IlexAquifolium

Care to elaborate teapot? :tongue:

Nope

Going to keep you all guessing! Plan b is becoming increasingly more obvious given what I've been told in the last 7 days and especially today.

Thing is, I think I'm beginning to want plan b more than plan a :confused:

Reply 1187

apotoftea

Nope

Going to keep you all guessing! Plan b is becoming increasingly more obvious given what I've been told in the last 7 days and especially today.

Thing is, I think I'm beginning to want plan b more than plan a :confused:

PM me then, you bloody tease! :tongue:

I spent all today trying to find a journal article using qualitative methods in my research field. It was like shooting fish in a barrel. Typing 'qualitative methodology' and '[my research field]' into google scholar is far less productive than you might think. In the end I used a search within a journal - and bingo, a really useful article that was only just published and had no citations, hence why it hadn't come up. Hurray!

Reply 1188

IlexAquifolium

PM me then, you bloody tease! :tongue:

Alright, alright :tongue:

I spent all today trying to find a journal article using qualitative methods in my research field. It was like shooting fish in a barrel. Typing 'qualitative methodology' and '[my research field]' into google scholar is far less productive than you might think. In the end I used a search within a journal - and bingo, a really useful article that was only just published and had no citations, hence why it hadn't come up. Hurray!

Hehe

Trying googling Catherine Tait (for historical reasons) Oh my life :woo:

Reply 1189

apotoftea

Hehe

Trying googling Catherine Tait (for historical reasons) Oh my life :woo:

Oh blimey! The problem in my case is that my field (well, the whole bloody discipline really - political scientists, eh? :rolleyes:

) use qualitative methods in a really slap dash way. I'm totally down with that, of course (a few elite interviews are far more up my street than the 'our methodology involved discussing life-forming childhood events with three participants, and was conducted from a constructivist viewpoint aiming to draw through their distinctive perceptions of infanthood and personal growth' ******** much beloved of some other social sciences...) but as a result they never actually discuss methodology in reflexive terms. It's common in quants research, but not quals. The other favourite is using archives but not actually discussing the use of archives - just chucking documents in as and when they bolster the argument. Now I think this is great and I do it all the time, but in the context of this assignment it just won't do. So I went through articles on my various past bibliographies - I re-scan-read about a hundred articles this morning - and NONE of them fitted the brief. Googling was making me swear because it wasn't throwing up anything (unsurprisingly since more or less no-one writes distinct sections on bloody qualitative methodology section that would show up in web indexes, argh, and that's what was required). So I'm very relieved I've got something.

Now I just have to read it and write the bloody essay by next week, of course....

Reply 1190

The Boosh

"But the legend of the rent was WAY PAST DUE...""""""""""

Consultant

Don't suppose anybody in here has done, or is doing an MBA? :smile:

I am

Reply 1192

Consultant

9

threeportdrift

I am

Hi!

Where are you? What did you do before? How's it going? How does it compare to work? How does it compare to undergrad/masters?

Et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. :biggrin:

I'm currently a consultant and will be doing my MBA over in the US soon, then hopefully back to the same firm but with a tidy little promotion. Haven't studied since I got my MEng though.

Reply 1193

Socrates

Why do some people think its cool to wear sunglasses when either a) the sun isn't out, or even worse b) at night? It just looks tacky and distinctly uncool. Should be banned tbh.

/rant

Reply 1194

Socrates

Why do some people think its cool to wear sunglasses when either a) the sun isn't out, or even worse b) at night? It just looks tacky and distinctly uncool. Should be banned tbh.

/rant

Agree with you, especially those massive aviator ones that make you look like a bumble bee :rolleyes:

Reply 1195

Jangrafess

What's worse are those ******* pink ones with little slits across them all the way down.

potty and Jangra.

Jangrafess

What's worse are those ******* pink ones with little slits across them all the way down.

Oo yes, those too.

Reply 1198

LLB Kevin

1

Socrates

Why do some people think its cool to wear sunglasses when either a) the sun isn't out, or even worse b) at night? It just looks tacky and distinctly uncool. Should be banned tbh.

/rant

Ah yes, but where's the harm? :tongue:

Reply 1199

Jangrafess